Bend a Honeycomb mesh?
Check this this question here creating a spherical array. It uses duplication methods in the object panel to array the other objects on a mesh, you could use faces instead of verts.

My method:-



The steps:-


  
  Add an icosphere
  Change the subdivision levels by pressing f6 to bring up the menu
  Go into edit mode and select all the faces.
  Press Ctrl+B to bevel and while in the bevel mode, press V to bevel only the vertices, eyeball the ratio to make the faces as equal as possible.
  Select all the faces again and press I to inset all the faces, while in the inset mode, press I again to inset individual faces.
  After inseting, delete the faces.
  


The blend file:- 

This method is poor and inconsistent as some of the faces remain unequal and distorted. While you can use the duplication method to array the hex mesh onto a sphere, the array would still remain separated and some places would still have distortion. I'm sure the animation nodes add-on or sverchok could easily do it, but I have no idea how to do it. You can try editing your question to make it suitable for animation nodes, that way it would attract more people to answer your question specifically pertaining to the animation nodes or sverchok.